The idea that users add value is one of the foundations of open source. Web 2.0 projects and companies -- whether giants like Amazon, eBay, and Google or startups like Flickr, del.icio.us, Digg, or YouTube -- have shown us that users have far more to offer than just their code or bug reports. Open source changed all the rules of the game. Now, web companies have figured out how to apply the principle of users as co-developers in other areas, creating a software ecosystem far larger than the world of strict open source in the process. These successful Web 2.0 companies have learned from open source and now have something to teach in return.

Tim O'Reilly will introduce four big ideas that are featured in this special Executive Radar day: Web 2.0 and the architecture of participation beyond software; asymmetric competition (changing the rules of the software industry); the challenges to the open source model provided by software as a service; and open data. In the course of the day, he'll put "traditional" open source companies on the Hot Seat, and put the Spotlight on innovative projects and startups.